Euronews

Syria has delivered a defiant message to the United Nations, blaming rebels for atrocities and comparing what it calls an invasion of foreign terrorists to the 9/11 attacks on America.

Again rejecting Western claims that the most recent chemical attack was the work of the Syrian government, its foreign minister went before the UN General Assembly to point the finger squarely at rebels and foreign jihadists.

“In my country there are civilians who are dying because they are fighting al Qaeda,” Walid al-Moualem told the UNGA. “It was us (Damascus) who asked the UN to investigate the use of chemical weapons and to find the real culprits as they (the UN) are the only ones capable of doing so.”

Damascus has long argued that chemical weapons have been used by rebels, not forces loyal to President Assad.

He has vowed to comply with the UN resolution on the destruction of Syria’s stockpile.

The foreign minister’s speech though was a clear attempt to persuade the UN to see the conflict in a different light – not as a civil war, but as its own war on terror.